


So Hearts Could Soar

by Omorka



Category: The Monkees (TV)
Genre: M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Transformation, Wing Kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-15
Updated: 2013-10-15
Packaged: 2017-12-29 11:42:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1005015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Omorka/pseuds/Omorka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a terrible gig, Mike accidentally lets slip a secret he's been keeping so close to the vest, it's under it.  Unfortunately for him, he's accidentally let slip a few secrets that belong to the other guys in the process - and one of his own he didn't know he had.</p>
            </blockquote>





	So Hearts Could Soar

If the gig had gone any worse, one of them would be in the hospital. As it was, Peter’s bass needed substantial repairs to its headstock, Mike’s guitar had lost a full set of strings, and Micky’s kit needed a new head for the floor tom. Davy had gotten off easy in comparison; the maraca he’d whacked their assailant in the head with had sustained only a minor dent. The cops had finally been convinced by the club owner that the Monkees had been acting purely in self-defense, that the clean-cut college kid who had hurled himself onto the stage and gone after their instruments was a former employee whose beef was really with the Cafe Parisian, not with the band or their long hair or their hippie music, so at least they weren’t in trouble with the law this time. But that didn’t ease the sting of the bruises, or pay for repairs they couldn’t afford.

The owner had paid them in full for the gig, even though they’d been interrupted, but he’d written a check. The banks wouldn’t be open until Monday, which meant not being able to practice properly for a whole weekend. While none of them were terribly good at budgeting in the first place, the extra expenses coming out of the gig check were going to take a chunk out of their food and utility money. At least they’d managed to scrape the rent for the month together already.

Then on top of everything, the Monkeemobile had gotten a flat tire on the way home. Fortunately, the spare was fine, and Micky was pretty sure the tire could be patched - another expense they didn’t need, but not as bad as having to buy a new tire.

They’d come back to the Pad a couple of hours ago and unloaded in a hurry. Clouds were building up over the bay; occasionally they could hear the echo of far-off thunder. By the time they’d set the instruments back up on the bandstand and cataloged the damage, an occasional flash of lightning in the dark lit up the windows.

Mike had carefully removed the remains of the six broken strings from Blonde Beauty, rubbed his hand over his face, and muttered quietly, “I’ll be back in a bit,” before dragging his feet out the door.

It was now two hours later, and the rains had finally broken about half an hour ago. Micky and Peter were going over their instruments for the fourth time, checking to make sure they hadn’t missed anything, while Davy stalked up and down the length of the den.

“We ought to go after him,” Davy said for the sixth time.

“We don’t know where he went,” Micky answered for the fifth time. “And even if we did, if we drive around on the spare we’ll end up with another flat, and then we’d all be stuck out in the rain instead of just one of us.”

Davy sniffed. “If it were Mike, he’d go after any one of us.”

Peter set the bass down and looked over at Micky, wide-eyed. “He’s right, Micky,” he said softly.

Micky set his sticks down on the drummer’s throne and came out from behind the kick drum. “Yeah,” he argued, “but he also wouldn’t want any of us to get hurt looking for him, and -”

He was interrupted by the door slamming open. Mike staggered in, his denim jacket and jeans sheeting rainwater onto the floor. “Y’all three,” he slurred, one hand coming up to point at them.

“MIKE!” The other three vaulted across the furniture (Micky and Davy successfully, Peter slightly less so) and raced to his side. “Are you okay?” Micky blurted, as Peter yelped “What happened?” and Davy scolded “Where have you been?”

“Ah’m fine,” Mike assured them. “Just - needed to collect my thoughts.” He took a step forward and slipped on the puddle dripping from his clothes.

Davy and Micky caught him before he could hit the floor. As his jacket brushed Davy’s face, the shorter singer’s nose wrinkled. “Mike,” he accused, “You’re stinking drunk!”

“Not allaway drunk,” Mike contradicted him. “Jus’ a lil’ tipsy.”

Peter helped Micky and Davy set Mike back on his feet and sniffed at his clothes. “Beer,” he announced. “Cheap beer. Mike, I know it was a hard day, but this isn’t the answer.”

Mike’s face fell. “I know,” he said mournfully. “But - it wasn’t jus’ today. That was jus’ the mud icing on the scum sandwich.”

Micky and Peter shared a glance. Mike was the only one of them old enough to legally drink, and there was nothing wrong with him having a beer now and then, but he rarely ever had more than a couple. He’d clearly had far more than that tonight. They’d only seen him this drunk once before, and that was after a girl dumped him for Davy.

“Where did you go?” demanded Micky.

“Up t’ the Pickled Pig,” Mike said. “Don’ worry - it was rrrrrreallly cheap beer. I didn’t spend too much.”

“We’re not worried about that!” Davy shouted. “We’re worried about you, Mike!” He dropped his voice. “This isn’t like you.”

“I s’pose it ain’t,” Mike agreed. “I better go sleep it off.”

Micky shook his head. “Not in those clothes, you’re not,” he stated. “You’re soaked to the bone, Mike; let’s get these off of you and get you in the shower -”

Mike reacted like he’d been stung; he jerked away from them and nearly fell over again. “Oh, no, no,” he protested, “these clothes’re stayin’ on!”

Micky and Davy each fell back a step; Peter stepped forward to take their place. “Michael,” he said softly, “it’s us. We’re not going to hurt you, okay?”

“Hurt me enough already,” Mike mumbled, swiping his hat from his head and brushing his bangs out of his eyes with it.

Davy cocked his head. “Begging your pardon?” he asked.

Mike raised his head, his eyes darting to each of them in turn. “You ain’t human, any of you,” he accused.

Their eyes widened; Peter’s and Micky’s jaws dropped open. “W-what?” Micky managed to stammer.

“Ain’t nohow human,” Mike continued. “Ain’t no human boys can be that pretty.”

Davy glanced back at Micky and Peter, who had grabbed onto each other for support. Micky hadn’t bothered to close Peter’s mouth; he looked like he was on the verge of a freakout himself. 

“What do you mean, Mike?” Davy asked again.

“I been around,” Mike slurred, leaning against the staircase. “Been in dives and juke joints and God-only-knows-where, singin’ for my supper. Been a lot of folks asked a lot of things from me, ‘cause they knew this Texas boy in California was down on his luck, before I met y’all.” He cleared his throat and looked away. “Asked things I ain’t never heard of before. Some of ‘em, the older women, I was tempted, I was sorely tempted. Even fell t’ the temptation once or twice.” He looked up into the rafters. “Some of ‘em, though, the menfolk, I wasn’t the least bit tempted, no matter how old or young or handsome or pretty they were. Don’t figure there’s a man alive who could tempt me that way.”

Micky started to say something, but Davy clamped a hand over the drummer’s mouth in time.

“But y’all,” Mike continued, “I look at y’all and I start thinking things no man should think about another man, feelin’ things no man should ever feel at all. Yer all - I mean, look at you.” His head came up as he stared at each of them fiercely. “Davy’s some kinda Cupid no girl can resist. Guess I mus’ be a girl, ‘cause I ain’t been able to, neither. Micky’s some Puck-elf out of Shakespeare or that trilogy you keep re-readin’, with secrets in his eyes I cain’t guess at, but I want to. I wanna push you on yer back an’ read those secrets under the stars. And Peter’s some kinda angel. You get a halo in the sunlight, Pete, you know that?”

“Michael.” Peter finally managed to get his mouth closed, and swallowed. “It’s just the sun in my hair, Mike. It bleaches blond if I’ve been out in the sun.”

Michael waved his hands in front of him. “It ain’t just that, Pete. It’s - you, in those tight swim trunks of your’n and your back bare, I can see where your wings should go. And every time, it makes me wanna sin so bad.” He paused, then pressed the hand that still held the hat to his chest and belched.

Micky glanced back at Peter again, and distant lightning flashed in his eyes. “Mike,” he said in that soft voice he only used when he was sad or speaking from the heart, “go on to bed. I’ll crash down here with Davy and Pete tonight, if you don’t want me up there. But get that wet stuff off first, or you’ll get sick.”

“Ain’t that I don’t want you,” Mike mumbled. “Problem is, I do.” He shuffled forward, as if he were going to put his hands on Micky’s shoulders, then thought better of it and swayed in place. “Don’t wanna put you out.”

“I’ll be fine,” Micky assured him. “Go sleep it off, okay?”

Mike fumbled his way up the stairs and closed the door behind him.

\---

Mike’s face was beet red in the midmorning light as he slunk down the spiral staircase. It would have been okay, he thought, if he’d been drunk enough that he couldn’t remember what had happened last night, but he remembered it entirely too clearly.

When he’d left, he’d intended to just grab a beer or two and try to unwind, because he desperately needed to yell at someone, and nothing that had happened was the other Monkees’ fault. He’d ended up tossing them back, along with one single shot of rot-gut rye, until the bartender had found him half-cussing, half-crying in the booth by the pinball machine, and had told him to go home and sober up.

If he hadn’t needed to pee so badly, he’d have been tempted to try to crawl out the window rather than face Micky, Davy, and Peter. He’d sworn to himself that how they made him feel would be a secret he took to the grave, and here it had only taken a couple of beers too many and he’d spewed it out all over them. His feelings, not the beer.

The three voices chatting in the kitchen fell silent as his bare feet hit the floor. He sprinted across the den to the bathroom, feeling three pairs of eyes on his back as he slammed the door.

After draining the lizard, he stared at himself in the mirror. He’d caught a wild swing from the fraternity brother who’d stormed the stage, when he tried to get between the guy and Blonde Beauty; he now had an ugly purple bruise on one shoulder. He’d tackled the guy twice before Davy had pegged the impromptu music critic in the head, but he didn’t seem to have picked up any marks from that part of the adventure.

His hair was damp. Whether that was from sweat or last night’s rain, he wasn’t sure.

He leaned against the mirror, his stomach churning. How was he going to show his face in front of the others? How could they possibly respect him, even accept him, after all he’d said?

The light tap at the door startled him. “Hey,” Micky brayed, “how long are you going to be in there, man? My back teeth are floating.”

“Be out in just a minute,” Mike called back, flushing again for good measure and grabbing his toothbrush. He only had a mild headache, but his mouth tasted like a small rodent had died in there sometime during the night.

When he finally pushed the door open, looking at least slightly more presentable, Micky ducked in past him with an unreadable expression. Mike pulled himself together and headed for the kitchen, where Peter and Davy were sitting with a plate piled high with buttered toast.

“Sorry,” Peter murmured as Mike glanced at the table. “We’re out of cereal, and this loaf was going stale.”

“Well,” Mike mumbled back, “that’s what happens when we get our bread from the day-old store.” Fishing a cheap tumbler out of the dishrack, he checked it for missed spots and poured himself a glass of orange juice. He stared resolutely out of the window as he chugged it and refilled the cup.

When he turned around, Micky was rejoining Davy and Peter at the table. Mike looked at his feet and blinked. Maybe they’d just ignore it all.

“Has he - ?” Micky whispered in Peter’s ear.

“Not yet,” Peter answered quietly.

Mike took in a breath slowly and let it cycle through his lungs. He was going to have to face up to it after all; Peter might be willing to let it go, and Davy might choose to ignore it, but Micky’s curiosity wasn’t going to let him do either. “Look, guys,” Mike started, “I’m sorry about last night.”

“You don’t need to apologize,” three voices chorused at him in near-unison.

“I wasn’t myself,” he said, his voice picking up slightly. The floor badly needed sweeping; his eyes found various patches of grime as he avoided his bandmates’ gazes.

“Nah, I think you were being perfectly you, Mike,” Micky said lightly. “Hey, Davy, I wanna see what the waves are like this morning before the tide goes back out. Maybe we got some interesting driftwood from last night’s storm. You wanna come with me?”

Davy paused, then replied, “Yeah, sure, okay, there might be a few birds sunbathing out there by now,” in that same artificially light tone. Mike watched Micky’s and Davy’s shadows cross the floor; the door onto the deck creaked open and clattered shut. Peter rose to his feet, and Mike waited to see if he would follow them, but he just stood next to the table.

Mike swallowed. He’d hoped to only have to deliver this apology once, if he had to deliver it at all, but it looked like he’d have to give it at least twice. On the other hand, he knew Peter would forgive him. Maybe he could use this as a trial run. He wet his dry mouth with the last of the orange juice and began again, “I was angry, but not at you guys, and I said a few things that - well, that might not have made much sense.”

“More than you know,” Peter replied, accompanied by a faint chiming sound, like the tinkling of well-tuned bells far in the distance.

Wait, that didn’t make sense, either. Mike looked up, and promptly dropped the tumbler; a tiny part of his mind was grateful it was melamine rather than ceramic as it clattered across the floor. The rest was occupied by the peculiar vision in front of him.

Peter had wings. Huge, brilliantly plumed ones, longer than he was tall; orange-and-gold feathers swept the floor at Peter’s heels. His eyes glowed like a warm sunrise on the prairie, and a spray of sourceless sunlight played around his shoulders. Even his freckles seemed to gleam.

“Sweet merciful heavens,” Mike blurted, and slid down the cabinets to sit on the floor as his knees gave out.

“I thought, since you’d guessed . . .” Peter let the words trail off, and shrugged. “Not a whole lot of point in hiding it any longer.” The soft, faraway chiming accompanied his voice, but it didn’t seem to be coming from him; it surrounded Peter, like the halo did.

Mike’s jaw worked silently. Maybe pointing would get the idea across? His fingers couldn’t figure out where to focus, though, skipping from broad pinions to glowing aura and back. Finally he scraped together enough voice to croak, “You really are an angel.”

Peter looked down at his wingtips and frowned slightly. “Technically, I’m a nephil,” he admitted.

“I have no idea what that is,” Mike said, glad he finally had something tangible to pin his confusion on for the moment.

“A half-angel,” Peter explained, leaning against the table with one hand as his wings brushed the chairs on either side. “At some point in the distant past, the Bene Elohim took human wives and had children with them; those children were the first nephilim. At the time, they were seen as giants.” He looked down at the bobble on Mike’s hat and smiled gently. “I guess humans got taller since then.”

Mike considered trying to stand up, and decided it wasn’t a good idea yet. “I refuse to believe you’re that old,” he stated flatly.

“Oh, no, not me,” Peter protested, and laughed; the distant chimes burst into a flurry of high arpeggios to accompany his laughter. He continued, “I don’t actually know when I was born, but it was after the archangels decreed that it wasn’t ever supposed to happen again. I was hidden away inside . . .” Peter paused and looked puzzled, as if he were searching for a word he’d just forgotten. “Inside myself, I guess. My parents brought me up like a human child; I knew I was different, but I think all children feel that way, or at least all the ones who aren’t popular, you know?”

“Boy, do I know,” Mike groaned, remembering a few dramatic schoolyard rebuffs of his own.

“So, I didn’t realize that the dreams and the memory of the wings and the not really understanding how people worked meant something else,” Peter finished. “Not until another nephil, one of the really ancient ones, found me. She taught me what I was, but then she left, because we’re really not supposed to exist and it’s dangerous to stay together, and I - I forgot again.”

Something about dreaming about wings sounded vaguely familiar to Mike, but he ignored it for the moment. “So you’re scatterbrained as a defense mechanism,” he realized aloud. “If you don’t know, neither can anyone else?”

“That’s what Micky said when he figured it out,” Peter said brightly.

Mike frowned at the idea that Micky would have realized something that important and not shared it with him. Then again, he brushed off Micky’s wackier ideas on a regular basis; would he have believed it?

But obviously someone else had figured it out. “Zero knew, too,” Mike said with a touch of anger.

Peter nodded. “I had forgotten. I didn’t remember until we were in You-Know-Where, and then I made myself forget again, because it _really_ wasn’t safe to remember there.” He paused, and the bells dropped into a minor key for a moment. “Micky realized it just after that,” he added. “It hasn’t been that long.”

Mike allowed himself a half-grin. “And here I thought this conversation was going to be about my spillin’ the beans last night, not about one of my wild metaphors turning out to be real.”

“Two,” Peter corrected. “Or, at least one-half and I guess one-eighth-ish.” He paused, his wings swaying slightly behind him and stirring crumbs in their wake. “You’re wrong about Davy, though. He’s as near to a hundred percent human as it gets.”

“One-eighth what?” Mike was confused again; he shifted on the floor and looked up at Peter.

“Some sort of fae folk,” Peter explained. “I don’t think he’s sidhe, though.”

“You mean Micky?” Mike held his head in his hands. “I wasn’t accusing him of being feminine,” he protested. “Although, you gotta admit, he is a little bit.”

Peter opened his mouth, then closed it again and smiled behind his hand. “No, I mean yeah, he is, but you guessed he was an elf last night. The sidhe are the Irish elves.”

Mike groaned, “You mean I was sorta right about that one, too?” Then his eyes narrowed. “How do you know that?”

“After he guessed, we kind of showed each other our true shapes,” Peter confessed, his cheeks coloring slightly. “I think you’d like him with the pointy ears. It’s a good look on him.”

“Am I the last to know everything around here?” Mike demanded, leaning back against the cabinets and slumping.

“No, that’s usually me,” Peter pointed out. “Are you okay on the floor like that?”

“I’m fine,” Mike grumbled. “So - have you told Davy yet?”

Peter glanced back at the windows. “We were sort of dancing around it before we heard you moving around upstairs,” he explained. “I think Micky’s breaking the part-elf thing to him out there. I don’t know if he’s telling him about me, too.”

Mike let his gaze travel up Peter from toes to halo. Peter’s bare feet pressed against the battered linoleum of the kitchen one at a time as he shifted his weight. He was wearing someone else’s pajama pants rather than his usual orange ones - probably Micky’s, Mike realized; he was the one who liked stripes. The orange ones were a one-piece, so of course Peter had chosen something else when he’d realized he was going to be showing off those wings. And apparently Micky was in on the gag.

“So what was Davy talking to you and Mick about?” Mike asked, partly out of genuine curiosity, partly to take his mind off of the combination of those sunrise-colored wings and Peter’s bare chest.

Peter blushed lightly again. “Well, mostly worried about you being so uptight you went out drunk in the rain,” he admonished Mike.

“But also what I said, right?” Mike replied. “Since he’s the only one I didn’t accidentally out to the world.”

“A bit,” Peter agreed. “But not in, you know, an ugly way or anything.”

Mike’s head dropped to his chest. “How else could you take it?” he said in a hoarse whisper. “I mean, big tall guy like me stumbles in drunk and tells you you’re pretty. Kind of hard to take that well.”

Peter shrugged, rippling his wings. “Why would he mind?” Peter asked, his voice betraying actual wonder. “I mean, he already knows he’s pretty. You’d have to be blind not to notice.”

“But - like _that_ ,” Mike choked out. Memories of all the fleeting thoughts he’d had crowded his mind. A glance at Davy’s ass as he shook the tambourine above his head; a caught-short stare at Peter as he wriggled his hips behind the bass; Micky in the plum dress and Mike clenching his hands into fists at the thought of tearing it off of him.

“Like I said,” Peter said cautiously, “you’d have to be blind.”

Mike caught something slightly off in Peter’s tone. He didn’t dare look up, but he asked, “Are you telling me you’ve looked at him like that, too?”

“And Micky,” Peter agreed. “I mean, Micky’s looked at Davy like that, not that I’ve looked at Micky like that.” His voice dropped to what on anyone else would still sound wide-eyed and open, but was nearly conspiratorial for Peter; the bells dropped to a soft shushing. “Although I have.”

Mike shook his head. “Don’t tell me we’re a band full of dirty queers,” he groaned. “I don’t think I can hack that.”

“Mike!” Peter yelped. “Such language!” He pushed himself away from the table, crossed his legs, and sank gracefully to a quarter-lotus on the floor next to Mike; his wings flared out behind him, a flurry of gold and orange. “I don’t think there’s anything the least bit dirty about us,” Peter sniffed.

Mike raised his head to tell Peter he was being naive, but he looked into the dawn-gold of Peter’s eyes and his train of thought promptly derailed. “I suppose,” he said instead, “I could live with having someone to commiserate with.”

Peter blinked at him. The glow in his eyes made it hard to tell exactly where he was looking; Mike couldn’t tell if Peter was meeting his gaze or not. 

“You know,” Mike continued when Peter failed to actually say anything, “if we’re all sort of mutually pining after Davy.”

“You mentioned people other than Davy last night,” Peter pointed out.

It was Mike’s turn to blink. He paused, half a dozen questions on his lips like the four of them in a doorway; none of them got through.

“I don’t know if Davy fells the same way or not,” Peter explained. “He - like I said, we were sort of dancing around it this morning. But I know Micky does. And I know I do.”

Mike licked his lips nervously. “About Davy, or each other, you mean?”

“Both, but mostly about each other,” Peter said carefully, “and about you, too, Mike.”

For a moment, all Mike could hear was his pulse in his ears. He let the breath he hadn’t intended to hold out in a whoosh. “Peter,” he groaned, “I ain’t pretty. We all know that, just as sure as we can see Davy is.”

“Maybe not pretty,” Peter agreed, “but beautiful all the same.”

That was a completely foreign idea. “You don’t mean that,” Mike snapped.

Peter looked hurt; his lip quivered. “Handsome, then?” he asked, as if it were a peace offering. The chimes in his voice swelled and rose with the question.

Mike rubbed the side of his face with the back of his hand, stalling for time. “You mean that?” he finally asked. “ ‘Cause I don’t think I’m much to look at at all.”

Peter looked up at the edge of the second-floor balcony, an odd smile creeping across his lips. “I’m not saying I’ve read it,” he began, “although I’m not denying it either, and I’m certainly not suggesting that you should, but if you look under Micky’s mattress behind the old suitcase by the wall, you might find a notebook filled with songs Micky’s started writing and never finished, or at least never presented to us, with, y’know, doodles and sketches in between the verses.” He paused, and the chimes seemed to giggle in the brief silence. “Most of the sketches are of Davy, but most of the songs are about you.”

Mike contemplated the effort of getting up, climbing the stairs, and hunting for the notebook. He decided against it, partly because his head was starting to throb, but partly because it meant leaving Peter.

He was really digging the wings.

Last night wasn’t the first time he’d called Peter an angel, only the first time anyone else had heard him say it. He’d even imagined the wings on him before, but they’d been white and fluffy, more or less just doves’ wings blown up to fit Peter. These, though - these were more like hawk’s wings, something big and majestic. He wouldn’t have thought Peter would look good in a bird of prey’s plumage, but it fit him so well.

“So, you’re okay with my having a schoolboy’s crush on you?” he asked Peter, carefully folding his hands in his lap.

“As long as you’re okay with my returning the favor, and Micky having one on you, too, and maybe Davy, we’re not sure about that,” Peter answered, and his smile lit up Mike’s world like the morning sunshine.

“Never would’ve dreamed,” Mike mumbled.

“I’m actually surprised you spilled the beans first, and not Micky, or maybe me,” admitted Peter. “I guess yesterday was tougher on you than we realized.”

Mike grabbed for the edge of the cabinets and hauled himself to his knees. “I should’ve seen him coming,” he growled, “and I just didn’t. I know the cops said he was attacking the instruments and not us, but I don’t see much of a difference.”

“There isn’t much of one,” Peter agreed; the chimes shifted to a minor key as he stole a regretful glance across the room at his wounded bass on its stand.

“But all I could think, afterwards,” Mike continued, squeezing his hands into fists, “was what would have happened if he really _had_ been going for one of us. For one of - of you guys.” Mike’s throat tightened. “I don’t think I could have forgiven myself. I sure didn’t last night.”

“Forgiveness is my job,” Peter said softly.

“You’re way better at it than me,” Mike mumbled. Peter’s left wing fluttered and brushed the cabinet just below Mike’s shoulder; without really thinking, he reached out to touch the rich plumage.

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea -” Peter half-gasped, reaching for Mike’s hand.

Mike tried to stop himself; of course touching his bandmates after his confession last night was going to be different now, more fraught. But his hand was already closing, Peter’s feathers warm and sleek under his fingers.

Suddenly, the room was freezing cold and Mike was shivering violently. The feathers under his fingers were still warm, and he reflexively clutched at them, at Peter, at the one thing in the entire world that hadn’t just turned to ice. The room seemed to be flooded with red light, but not a warm red, not a firey red; somehow this red was as cold as the frost that seemed to be creeping across his fingers, across his forehead, into his mouth. The headache from the hangover flared and tried to split his skull in two; he pitched forward, his hands clapped to his head as if shoving his hat down would help.

He only vaguely felt Peter’s wings wrap around him, a downy cocoon. He _did_ feel the smooth skin and soft fuzz of Peter’s chest against him, and he clung to Peter as if nothing else could ever make him warm again.

Slowly, the feeling of frostbite receded, leaving him only somewhat chilly, but the red light was still there. Mike opened his mouth to say something - whether to thank Peter or ask what had happened, he wasn’t sure.

The feel of his tongue on his teeth stopped him before he could get a word out. They were both pointed. His teeth were sharp. Not shark-sharp, but alligator-sharp.

His hands found his head again. A pair of bony points protruded from his hair just above his temples. Only an inch or two long, but those were definitely horns. As he lowered his hands, he noted that his nails had grown longer and sharper, too, although they were still fingernails, not claws yet.

“What in the- ?” he forced out. The “th” nearly came out as a hiss as his tongue caught on the points of his new teeth.

“I was afraid that was going to happen,” Peter sighed.

“Afraid what was going to happen?” Mike demanded. He glanced rapidly around. “That red light is coming from me, isn’t it?”

“From your eyes,” Peter agreed. “We’re a nice matched pair.”

Mike forced down the panic rising in his throat. “I’m a demon, you mean,” he said, as calmly as possible.

“Part-demon,” Peter agreed. “A cambion. Or, more likely, a descendant of one.” He pressed his nose into Mike’s hair and sniffed. “You’re way less than half-blooded,” he said in what was probably meant to be a reassuring tone. “Maybe an eighth, same as Micky?”

“I know I don’t show my face in church that often,” Mike protested, “but I’m a Christian.”

“So was Merlin, at least in most of the Arthurian stories,” Peter pointed out, “and he was half-and-half, same as me.”

“Merlin’s fictional,” Mike spat. Hauling himself the rest of the way to his feet (which showed no signs of turning into hooves, at least), he yanked himself away from Peter and shoved open the door to the downstairs bedroom. He planted his hands on Davy’s dresser, shivering a bit with the cold, and leaned down to look in his mirror.

Glowing crimson eyes. Sharp canines, both upper and lower, and sharpened incisors, although not as sharp as they felt; if he didn’t open his mouth too wide he could still pass for fully human there. Short, slightly twisted dark brown horns, just above his temples and just too long for him to hide them in his hair.

Peter stepped up behind him. “You had no idea?” he asked in a near-whisper.

“No.” Mike twisted around; no sign of a tail, at least. “Although it might explain a couple of things about my dad, come to think of it.”

“I figured you’d’ve gotten an inkling when Zero gave us the vision of You-Know-Where,” Peter continued. The chimes were soft and almost monotonic, more soothing than pretty.

“It felt familiar,” Mike admitted, “but I had no idea this was why. I figured it was him trying to tell me I’d end up there.” He yanked his hat down again; it covered the horns if he pulled the cuff down far enough. “Guess I don’t have a choice, now.”

“Oh, we get choices,” Peter contradicted him. “Nephilim don’t automatically go to Heaven, and cambions don’t automatically go to You-Know-Where. The human side is stronger like that.” He stepped closer to Mike, his wings curling around protectively. “I mean, I’m half-and-half, and you’re way more Christian than I am.”

“How come I don’t get wings?” Mike complained. His shoulders itched, but there was no other sign of the transformation affecting him there.

“Like I said, you’re not a whole halfbreed,” Peter explained again. “Although there might be a way to bring your wings out, if you really want them.”

Mike shook his head, turning to face Peter instead of the mirror. “This is going to be hard enough to hide as it is,” he said. “How am I going to ride the bus like this?”

“You can change back,” Peter assured him. “We may have to practice how. I think touching me while I’m transformed changed you, too, so - maybe hold onto me while I change back?”

“Wait,” Mike blurted.

Peter stopped, still watching Mike closely. Mike pushed the hat up, felt at the horns again, and exhaled. After cycling through another couple of lungfuls of air, he asked, “So does Micky know about this, too?”

Peter shook his head. “Not as far as I know,” Peter assured him. “Although I guess he might have guessed, same as me, and then just not mentioned it.”

Mike sat down on the edge of Peter’s bed and tugged at the banket. “Why is everything so cold?” he asked. “I’m freezing.”

Peter looked apologetic. “Because the form you’re in now is native to someplace a lot hotter,” he explained.

“So why are you the only warm thing in here?” Mike asked, his voice sliding higher.

Carefully arranging his wings so he wouldn’t sit on them, Peter settled next to Mike. “It has to do with the nature of You-Know-Where,” he said, lowering his own voice as if he were afraid of being overheard. “It’s not the brimstone that makes it an awful place. You figured it out yourself, Mike, when I was too scared and confused to.”

“It’s a place without love,” Mike realized aloud. “It’s being removed from the love of God that makes it a punishment.”

Peter nodded. “So, what would make that bearable?”

“The love of someone else?” Mike guessed, although he only half believed it.

“Right!” Peter beamed at him, quite literally; his eyes looked like searchlights for a moment.

“ ‘Cause that’s where the power’s at,” Mike murmured, more to himself than Peter. He scooted closer to Peter on the bed. “So - I guess what I’m asking is, share some of that warmth with me?”

“Of course!” Peter nearly flung himself at Mike, and suddenly Mike had a lapful of delighted nephil. He hadn’t quite expected Peter to be that enthusiastic, nor had he expected Peter’s next move to be to remove Mike’s pajama shirt, but it was on the floor before he knew it.

Peter slid his arms around him in a surprisingly gentle embrace for how quickly he’d been moving. “Is that a little warmer?” he breathed in Mike’s ear.

“Much,” Mike replied, and it was - the bone-chill that had sunk into him since his sudden transformation had begun to ease as soon as Peter had touched him. Cautiously, he raised his hands to Peter’s shoulders. He was surprised to realize he could feel the aura; it made his skin tingle where he passed his hands through it.

Peter shivered. “Mmm,” he gasped, “that’s nice, Michael.”

Mike tried to suppress the laugh that burbled up. “You can feel that, too?” he asked, tracing his fingers through the shimmer of light around Peter’s head.

“Mmm-hmm,” Peter answered, closing his eyes and grinning.

“I think it’s trying to burn me,” Mike said, trying to be serious again, “and it’s just not hot enough. It feels a little like getting shocked.”

“Don’t do it if you don’t want to,” Peter said with concern as he opened his eyes.

“Naw,” Mike reassured him, “it’s fine.” He made another couple of passes as Peter closed his eyes again and made soft noises somewhere between a purr and a whimper. “But I think I’d like to play with your wings more,” Mike admitted. “If you’re okay with it, I mean.”

“Go ahead,” Peter said, and the chimes trilled their approval.

Mike raised one hand to the leading edge of Peter’s left wing and gave it one long stroke, as far down as his arm could reach. Peter tensed up and gasped, and Mike snatched his hand away, but Peter caught it and put it back. “It’s okay, Michael,” Peter breathed. “It’s more than okay. I just - no one’s ever done that before, and it’s intense.”

“Should I go slower?” Mike asked. He’d asked a dozen girls that question, for various reasons, but he’d never imagined he’d be asking a man, much less a half-naked angel.

“Just a little,” Peter answered. “It felt really good.”

Mike repeated the gesture at half the speed he’d used before, savoring the feel of Peter’s golden feathers under his fingertips; Peter groaned and shivered under his touch. Slowly, he picked up a bit more speed, stroking along each wing in turn, until he was working with both hands in Peter’s feathers, gently massaging the miraculous limbs that by rights shouldn’t be there. 

Peter arched his spine and dropped his head back. Glimmers of dawn-light peeked from under his trembling eyelashes. “Ah, Mike,” he breathed, “that’s - that’s so groovy, man, I can’t - I can’t explain.”

“You don’t have to explain anything,” Mike breathed back. “Just show me.” He could feel Peter’s arousal brushing against his own through the thin fabric of their pajamas, and he desperately wanted to do something about that, too, but the feel of Peter’s pinions under his fingers seemed vastly more important at the moment.

“Okay,” Peter whispered; his hands found Mike’s shoulder blades and started tracing along them. 

Mike let his eyes close and discovered that instead of the usual darkness he got that dull red glow again; it seemed to pulse brighter in time with Peter’s palms pressing into his back. Something tickled back there, as if he’d had a sunburn and the last of the peeling skin was flaking off, but that didn’t make any sense; Mike hadn’t been careless enough to get sunburned in years. He was about to dismiss it in favor of paying attention to Peter’s groin again, when Peter suddenly dug in with his nails, and Mike felt the sharp pain of the skin on his back tearing - 

And a pair of wings, featherless but easily as large at Peter’s, unfolded from his shoulders.

As soon as they sprang into existence, they cramped. Mike’s eyes flew open as he convulsively flexed them and then snapped them open as far as they would go; he’d imagined they’d be jet black and scaly, but no, they were definitely leathery and scale-less, and more of a charcoal grey than deep black.

“I found your wings, Mike!” Peter exclaimed happily. “Now you look more like a full cambion.”

“That wasn’t what I was expecting, exactly,” Mike drawled. His eyebrows jumped as he realized his voice now had its own accompaniment; the sounds of a bonfire just out of sight crackled under his words.

“I know,” Peter laughed, “but now I can return the favor.” He reached out and stroked the top of Mike’s new limbs with his thumbs, and Mike shuddered.

It really did feel _good_. Not good enough to get him off, but that was almost irrelevant. He’d been holding these in, not even knowing they existed except in half-remembered dreams of falling, his entire life, and now an angel - sorry, half-angel - was massaging them into existence for him.

He folded them around Peter and nuzzled the nephil’s neck. Mike was sure if anyone from Zero’s camp or from Upstairs saw them, they’d be horrified, but it just didn’t matter. The majority of him that was human had quietly loved and lusted after Peter for over a year, and whatever this was in him that had changed his shape _needed_ Peter, needed him to stay warm in the cold that was a loveless world.

“Touch me,” Peter whimpered, and Mike realized that he wasn’t the only one filled with needing.

They stroked each other’s wings and rocked against each other for several long minutes, until Peter shuddered, wept a few drops of liquid sunlight, and went limp in Mike’s arms. Mike held him close and wondered what that reaction was, and what an angel’s orgasm would look like.

His tongue brushed his pointed teeth. Sin it might be, but he aimed to find out, as soon as Peter was ready for it.

\---

Davy ran his fingers through Micky’s curls and shook his head.

It was strange enough, this thing they had where they ended up on a beach blanket with one of their heads in the other one’s lap. Usually it was like this, with Micky’s head in Davy’s lap, but it had happened more than once the other way, with Micky petting Davy’s hair like he was a giant cat. Davy wasn’t sure how it had started anymore, but it was oddly comfortable. 

“-And that’s why we were so startled when Mike brought it up,” Micky was finishing.

This was even stranger. Normally, Davy would have brushed it off as yet another of Micky’s wild stories. Having a doppelganger was one thing; Davy’d met his own in the shape of Prince Ludlow. But being part fairy? That was ridiculous, wasn’t it?

And then Micky had demonstrated. At first, Davy had assumed it was some sort of smoke-and-mirrors thing, some Hollywood special effect that Micky had re-appropriated. But then Micky had laid his head in Davy’s lap, like they had been doing recently, and Davy had felt the pointed ears for himself. They felt warm and real, and they were certainly attached.

“Apparently I get it from both sides,” Micky said, laughing at himself. “Part faun on Dad’s side, part banshee on Mom’s. Explains a few things, doesn’t it?”

“A bit,” Davy agreed as he tucked a stray curl behind one of the leaf-shaped ears. “So what’s up with Peter, then? And how did Mike figure all this out?”

“I think,” Micky said cautiously, “that I should probably let them tell you that. If I try to explain Mike’s part of the story, I’ll probably get it wrong, and if I try to explain Peter’s part, I may end up telling you things he doesn’t know about it yet, and that could get really complicated.”

Davy looked down at Micky and wrinkled his nose. “How does that work?” he protested. “You knowing more about Peter’s situation than he does?”

Micky held up two oddly elongated fingers. “One,” he proclaimed, folding one down into his palm, “this is Peter we’re talking about here. He’s not exactly intensely curious about things, especially ones that could hurt someone’s feelings, including his own.”

“Fair enough,” Davy admitted. He glanced back at the Pad; for a moment, he’d thought he’d seen an odd reflection off of the bay windows, like a glimpse of sunset in the middle of the day, but there was nothing unusual there now.

“Two,” Micky continued, “I’m the only one around here who has a library card and isn’t afraid to use it.” He propped himself up on his elbows. “And I think _that_ was them working things out, at least enough that we won’t be in the way.”

Davy blinked at Micky as the drummer jumped to his feet. “So, you’re going to tell Mike, is that it?” he asked, still not quite sure where Micky’s meandering explanation was leading to.

“About being part elf, sure,” Micky agreed, stretching. “About all of us having a mutual crush on him? That depends on how he and Peter are making out.”

Davy was about to point out the double entendre when he realized it was almost certainly deliberate. He sighed, shrugged, and began rolling up the beach towel. “It isn’t that I’m uncomfortable with it, you know,” he protested. “I mean, everyone falls in love with me. It’d be weird if you and Mike and Peter didn’t.”

Micky shrugged. “We just weren’t sure you knew it worked on everyone, not just girls. It’s a heck of a family curse.”

“Curse is too strong a word,” Davy objected. “More of a blessing gone a little topsy-turvy.”

“With fairy magic, those are pretty much the same thing,” Micky explained.

“Oh,” Davy said. “Well, either way, it’s not that I’m not open to the idea, it’s just that I’ve never done it before.” He tied up the towel and slung it over his shoulder. “And I didn’t want to make things weird for the rest of you.”

“We’re already weird enough,” Micky admitted. “But if we all feel the same way, or pretty close to it, I for one don’t see any reason not to try it.”

“Except for breaking up the band if it doesn’t work out,” Davy argued as they made their way up the beach. “It’s not like Mike and I have much to fall back on then.”

Micky frowned; it was an odd look on him usually, and even more so with the ears. “That’s why I hadn’t brought it up before now,” he pointed out. “But now that Mike’s brought it out into the open, it makes more sense to deal with it than ignore it, you know?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Davy agreed reluctantly. “We should at least talk about it.” He shaded his eyes as he looked up towards the Pad; he kept thinking he was seeing lights in the windows, like little red and gold fireflies, but that didn’t make sense.

“And it looks like I was right about the last piece of the puzzle, too,” Micky murmured, more to himself than to Davy, as he followed Davy’s gaze and started up the stairs.

Davy blinked. “What does that mean?” he demanded, following behind Micky and trying not to stare at his ass.

Micky giggled and grabbed his hand. “It’s easier to show you than to tell you,” he laughed as he reached for the door; Davy followed behind him, wondering vaguely when the Pad had acquired a set of windchimes and a crackling fireplace.

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah. Monkee wing-kink. I don't know either; I blame the one episode where everyone except Mike wears an angel costume for a fantasy sequence and the infamous satyr photo from the deleted scene from _Head_.


End file.
